


You're in Your Own Way Again

by ilookedback



Category: The Mandalorian (TV)
Genre: (she doesn't see his face!), (sorry!!), (sorry?), Come Eating, F/M, Oral Sex, Post-Episode 1x08, Vaginal Sex, a little bit angsty but not overly so, alternating povs, and has a liiiiittle bit of self-loathing related to his Life Choices, anyway there is no plot here despite the length, basically 7k words of soft touching and lovemaking, big dick din, din is not a virgin but is a bit touch-starved and TENDERNESS-starved, so contains general spoilers for season 1, the helmet stays on... for the most part, they really just touch each other a lot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-05
Updated: 2020-07-05
Packaged: 2021-03-05 01:22:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,676
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25096048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ilookedback/pseuds/ilookedback
Summary: She watches him as he watches the child for a few moments. Her heart aches and suddenly—somehow in this dimly lit, quiet room, the moment feels surreal. Like she can’t be certain he’s really here.“I didn’t think I’d ever see you again,” she confesses. “I didn’t—I feel like maybe I’m in a dream.”He turns his head to look at her but stays quiet.“I wish that I could touch you,” she says, her face flushing with heat as soon as the words are out of her mouth. But. It’s thetruth. She does wish it. Has been wishing for it. The sight of him without his armor is like nothing she’d have ever dared to hope for, and the thought of pressing close to him, feeling his body heat through something thinner than a layer of steel, almost makes her feel dizzy with wanting it.He tilts his head, looking at her. “You can touch me,” he says, and she could swear he almost sounds amused. “Anywhere the helmet doesn’t cover.”Her whole body goes hot. “Really?”“Really.”(In which Din returns to Sorgan after the events of episode 8 and experiences a little bit of healing kindness)
Relationships: The Mandalorian (The Mandalorian TV)/Omera (Star Wars)
Comments: 43
Kudos: 170





	You're in Your Own Way Again

**Author's Note:**

> (Just to reiterate, this contains spoilers for the Season 1 finale and the series in general)
> 
> One of the most heartbreaking things to me about the season one finale was that, in those final moments, Din believes he's killed Moff Gideon and, I imagine, feels a sense of safety for the first time since picking up Baby Yoda. I really wanted to let him have a quiet moment of rest and recovery before the inevitable battles he will face in season two. Sigh!! So this fic takes place shortly after episode 8, with Din going back to Sorgan for a few days to catch his breath.
> 
> Title is from "Carve Our Names" by Tired Pony.

When he reaches the village, Winta is among the first people he encounters. She looks mildly interested to see him but overjoyed when she catches sight of the child bundled in his arms. The baby recognizes her, too; he’s suddenly squirming in Din’s grip, wanting to get down.

“Alright,” he murmurs, depositing the child on the ground in front of her. Winta drops to her knees, cooing a hello and leaning forward to let the child pat her face in greeting. He smiles, watching the happy reunion for a moment, before interrupting to ask, “Where is your mother?”

She barely glances up, distracted by the way her fingers fit inside the baby’s enthusiastic grip. Nodding behind them, she tells him, “She’s in the house.”

“Will you watch him while I go talk to her?”

It’s clear nothing would make her happier, and he leaves them be and makes a path to the house he remembers to be Omera’s.

The door is halfway open and he pauses hesitantly in the doorway. He can just see the edge of her, moving about the kitchen, humming to herself. He raps on the door frame to get her attention. She spins around, sees him, and smiles broadly. “Come in!” she calls out.

He makes his way through the dim living area to the kitchen, which is warm with late afternoon sunlight. He hesitates again in the doorway and they both stand there for a moment, smiling at each other. Well—he realizes belatedly, she can’t see that he’s smiling. But the comfort of a familiar, friendly face, of feeling something like _safe_ and _home_ for the first time in months, makes his chest go tight and warm and he wonders if she can’t sense his expression even through the helmet.

“Hi,” he says finally.

“Hi,” she says back. Her face flashes with concern, suddenly, as she glances around his feet. “Where’s your boy?”

He gestures vaguely over his shoulder. “Winta nearly snatched him out of my hands when we arrived. I left her to watch him for a bit.”

She smiles again, the soft look she always saved for her daughter. “She’ll love that,” she says, then adds drily, “You’ll get him back from her just as soon as he starts fussing.”

She turns away briefly to stir a simmering pot on the stove. “Please, have a seat if you like.”

He can tell that she’s watching him out of the corner of her eye, and he tries to hide the stiffness in his muscles as he sits down, but he sees her brow furrow and she turns back to look him over critically. “Are you well?”

A seemingly innocuous question, but he can tell there is a lot riding on how he answers it—and as soon as he’s had that thought, he realizes he’s already paused too long in his response. “Yes,” he says belatedly. She looks skeptical. “Well enough.” That didn’t help. She’s frowning at him, narrowed eyes focused directly on his visor, like she can see right through him. Her eyes sweep from head to feet, slowly, as though she thinks he’s hiding a gaping bullet wound somewhere underneath his armor.

Which. Might not be unprecedented, for him.

He pushes back a little from the table, throwing his arms wide, on display for her assessing gaze. “I’m in one piece,” he assures her. Slowly, she walks over to him and reaches her hands out. He tenses despite himself when she touches his helmet, but she only skims her fingers down to land on his shoulders and then, to his surprise, she pulls him to her, hugging his head to rest on her belly. He’s frozen for a second, and then tentatively, he wraps his arms around her hips, accepting the hug. He can just barely feel the slight movement of her hand stroking the back of his shoulder, soothing. He closes his eyes against a sudden prickle of hot tears and fights not to squeeze her too tightly, even though… part of him finds he wants to stay like this forever. His throat feels like it’s closing up and he forces himself to take a deep, quiet breath.

“Will you tell me what happened after you left?” she asks quietly. He thinks about it. The shitty, double-cross jobs he’d taken; the bounty hunters with tracking fobs he’d ducked and, in some cases, killed; the firefight, the _fire_ —the death he thought he couldn’t escape. The deaths he couldn’t prevent. Kuiil and the IG unit who’d saved his life. The pile of discarded helmets in the empty covert. His stomach twists and he wishes, again, that he could burrow deeper into Omera’s belly and just. Stay there. Suddenly, more than anything, he feels bone-deep exhaustion hitting through his body.

“Yes,” he tells her finally. Maybe not all of it, but some. “But not tonight.”

She hums in understanding and leans down to press a kiss to the top of his head. “The stew in the pot is for you, when you’re ready to eat. And I made up a bed in the barn for you when - when we saw your ship land.” He tilts his head back to meet her gaze. “I dared to hope that you were coming back to us.” She says it with a playful smile, but her eyes are serious.

His voice feels rough when he tells her thank you.

Along with the stew and a sweet sticky rice cake, she brews him a pot of the herbal tea she favors herself on nights when she struggles to sleep. She helps him carry it to the barn and hovers in the doorway, watching him slump into a chair at the little table she’s set up for him. He looks at her, waiting.

“I’ll leave you to eat,” she says. “I’ll have Winta feed the baby and I’ll bring him to you later.”

“Thank you.”

Back at the house, Winta proudly tells her mother how she’d stopped the child _three times_ from eating a live frog as they played outside. “He must have a healthy appetite,” Omera observes, and shows Winta how to feed him carefully, making sure the food isn’t too hot.

He falls asleep in her arms by the time she reaches the Mandalorian’s temporary residence. She pauses outside the doorway, not wanting to startle the occupant but hating to wake him if he’s already sleeping. “Knock knock,” she calls out softly. She hears the creak of a floorboard and then his voice, telling her to come in.

She blinks in surprise when she sees him. His helmet is still on, obscuring his face, but the rest of his armor has been removed—stacked carefully against the wall near his bed, she sees—and he’s dressed in a comfortable-looking set of pants and a long-sleeved shirt. He doesn’t seem to notice her surprise, or he ignores it if he does, and instead gently takes the baby from her arms, stroking the child’s ear lovingly and setting him in the crib at the foot of the bed.

She watches him as he watches the child for a few moments. Her heart aches and suddenly—somehow in this dimly lit, quiet room, the moment feels surreal. Like she can’t be certain he’s really here.

“I didn’t think I’d ever see you again,” she confesses. “I didn’t—I feel like maybe I’m in a dream.”

He turns his head to look at her but stays quiet.

“I wish that I could touch you,” she says, her face flushing with heat as soon as the words are out of her mouth. But. It’s the _truth_. She does wish it. Has been wishing for it. The sight of him without his armor is like nothing she’d have ever dared to hope for, and the thought of pressing close to him, feeling his body heat through something thinner than a layer of steel, almost makes her feel dizzy with wanting it.

He tilts his head, looking at her. “You can touch me,” he says, and she could swear he almost sounds amused. “Anywhere the helmet doesn’t cover.”

Her whole body goes hot. “Really?”

“Really.”

“Then—” And she thinks again about how stiffly he was moving earlier, the wince of pain as he sat down and stood up. About how he wouldn't tell her, yet, what kind of battles he’d seen since he’d left Sorgan the last time. And she wants to see, for herself. To make sure he’s whole, and alive, and okay. “Then wait here. I’ll be right back.”

It takes her longer than she’d intended before she can return, because she tucks Winta into bed when she gets back to the house and then gathers her medkit and healing balm. And a lantern to see by, as it’s finally getting dark. When she gets back, she knocks quietly again, and he calls her in quietly again, but this time when she enters he hasn’t bothered getting up to greet her. He’s lying on the bed, and he’s taken off his shirt.

Well.

Now that she has his bare skin in front of her, she’s nearly overwhelmed by it, and she spends a long moment just staring, taking him in. Finally she comes back to herself and walks over to set down her lantern and supplies on the little table by the head of the bed. She sits next to him, hip to hip, and looks carefully over his skin, assessing.

He is so _human_ , it strikes her. He is just a man, under all his layers. His skin is a pale tan, dotted with scars, some old and barely-there faded, others a fresh deep pink that makes her stomach drop. There’s a large patch of skin over his ribs that is turning an ugly yellow-purple with bruising. She lands her fingers lightly on it, skimming over his velvet soft skin.

He tenses up when she touches him, like his breath has gotten caught in his lungs. She looks up at his face, hidden as always, and she lowers the palm of her hand against his side, waiting to feel him breathe again. Finally, he sighs, and she lets her hand wander, leaning closer over him as she gently pokes and prods, using her inexpert judgment to try to see how badly he’s hurt.

She’s surprised when he lifts a hand and traces it through her hair. His head is tilted towards her, and his hand keeps lifting and falling, fingers combing through her hair like he’s mesmerized by it.

“Soft,” he murmurs. “Your hair is like silk.” She wonders when in his life he’s had the luxury of touching real silk. But before she can dwell on that thought, he’s gathered her hair in his hand, twisting it around a couple of times until the tugging movement forces her head to tilt back and she gasps in surprise. As quickly as he’s done it, he loosens his grip again and drops his hand.

Her fingers are trembling and she digs them into his skin a little to still them. She thinks she senses him trying not to squirm in reaction and the thought occurs to her that she could use her nails on him, scratch softly over the sensitive skin of his chest. Touch through the trail of dark hair on his lower belly, leading down into his pants. She doesn’t, though. She just thinks about it. And _wants_. She moves her hands again, to safer places, running down his upper arm. Her thumb catches on a line of scarring on his bicep and she rubs over it gently.

“When is the last time someone touched you like this?” she asks, trying to ignore the thread of jealousy running through her question. She thinks of his easy rapport with Cara. Of the women he must have been with before her, and will again after he inevitably leaves.

“Like this?” he asks. She’s gratified to hear his voice turning drowsy, his muscles relaxing under her hands. It’s quiet for a moment. “Nobody’s ever touched me like _this_.”

Her fingers, her body, her _mind_ goes still. _Oh_.

When she can speak again, she nudges the side of his arm. “Turn over.”

He huffs out a sigh, like maybe she’s inconveniencing him, but he obliges, slowly rolling over onto his side and then sinking onto his belly, shifting his hips to get comfortable and raising his arms to pillow his head onto his hands.

His back is one big bruise, mottled purple and blue, like dark shadows in the sloping light of the lantern by the bed, except that they don’t move when the light flickers. They’re real, and he’s real, and she’s really touching him. And she feels helpless.

He shifts again and she realizes she hasn’t moved. “Is it that bad?” he asks. His tone is sleepily curious, but not concerned. Like he could be asking about somebody else. She runs her fingers across his warm skin and sees him shiver.

“You’re all black and blue,” she tells him. “What happened?”

“I got knocked down.”

Somehow, she imagines this is an understatement. But she’s not sure anymore that she wants to hear the details, so she nods and lets it go. From the side table, she picks up the jar of healing balm she’d brought from home and opens it, scooping some out with two fingers before recapping the jar. She lets it warm between her hands for a moment before spreading it across his back and moving to massage it gently into his skin.

He groans, quietly, muffled by his helmet and the pillow his face is buried in. She hesitates. “Am I hurting you?”

He shifts a little again, muscles rippling under her stilled hands. “No,” he says finally. “It’s fine.”

“It’ll make the bruising heal faster,” she tells him as she begins to massage his lower back again. “The herbs are good for circulation, so your blood won’t pool as much.”

He hums in acknowledgment and they both go quiet for a few minutes while she carefully works the balm into his skin. It goes from slippery to tacky to mostly dry and by the time that she’s done she finds herself running her fingers over his back in the patterns she uses on Winta when she’s soothing her daughter to sleep. Fingertips gently tapping like rainfall all the way down his back. Palms pressing warmth like the sun into his shoulder blades.

His breathing is slow and steady and she breathes in time with him, her hand rising and falling where it rests on his back. She leans down, letting her hair brush over his shoulder, and gently picks up his hand and brings it to her face, pressing a kiss against his knuckles. His fingers tighten around hers for a second but she can tell he’s nearly asleep. She tilts her face toward his helmet, slowly loosening her grip on his hand. Trying to tear herself away. Reminding herself that he’s _real_ and that he’ll still be here in the morning.

“Goodnight, dear one,” she whispers. “You can take your helmet off in a minute, I’m leaving.”

She’s halfway to the door when she hears a quiet goodnight murmured behind her. She doesn’t let herself look back.

And if she touches herself that night, beneath her blankets, and thinks of his skin hot under her hands and the trail of hair leading down his stomach and what it would be like to get her _mouth_ on him—well. That’s between her and the darkness.

It’s a few nights later, after dinner—she’d convinced him to come back to the house after he’d eaten on his own—and she’s mixed them each a cup of spotchka and fruit juice and rigged him a straw from a slim reed so he can drink with her without removing his helmet. And maybe it’s the alcohol loosening his inhibitions, or maybe it’s desperation borne of the fact he’s already told her he’s leaving tomorrow, that this visit was never meant to be for long—

Whatever it is, she feels his gaze heavy on her from behind his helmet, and she’s already buzzing in anticipation by the time he finally speaks, echoing her words from before in a low, low voice. “I wish that I could touch you.”

“You _can_ ,” she breathes. He shakes his head. She wonders if he’s surprised, maybe, by the surety of her answer. If he thinks she doesn’t know what he means.

“We shouldn’t. I can’t stay,” he reminds her.

She aches for him. For his heart and for her own want of him. “I know,” she tells him. “I don’t expect you to. But I’d rather have something of you than nothing. Wouldn’t you?”

He tilts his head, contemplating that. He’s silent for a long moment but she sees his fingers clenching and straightening in turn. Itching to feel her.

She’d sent the baby and Winta off to her cousin’s house earlier, to let the kids play together and give the Mandalorian a quiet night of rest before he’s off on his own again with the child, alone together as he flies them through the galaxy searching for something he could barely explain to her. She admires him for it, could sense the deeper sense of tenderness he exudes around the child now, and the pride in his voice as he’d explained the new signet on his pauldron. The tentative, but solid sense of purpose behind his journey. But she still wishes they would stay.

He’s not wearing his full armor with her again, like he’s letting himself get comfortable and relaxed in her presence. Like he feels at home. She finds that she’s holding her breath, waiting for him, watching the steady rise and fall of his chest under the single layer of his shirt.

“Okay,” he says finally, barely above a whisper. And she takes him to her bed.

He touches her gently, running his bare fingers lightly over her soft hair, the smooth skin of her cheekbones, over her shoulders, and down her arms, circling loosely around her wrists—he doesn’t grab her tightly but he presses his fingers to her pulse, feeling her heart rate tick up. He thinks he could pin her down, cover her with his whole body, and he wonders if she’d let him. If she’d like that. He lets go.

He’s sitting next to her where she lies, hip to hip, a mirror image of how she’d sat over him that night in the barn. She shifts on the bed next to him and plucks at her dress. “Take this off me,” she urges him, half sitting up and starting to tug at the fabric herself. He goes still and lets out a surprised huff of breath at her eagerness before he reaches out and firmly takes hold of the dress, pulling it up and over her head. She’s left in her leggings and a bandeau around her breasts, sinking into the soft sheets beneath them when she lays back down onto the bed. He stares down at her for a minute, letting his eyes play over the expanse of bare skin before him, the vision of her laid out for him, her sweet face looking up at him expectantly. He wants all of her. He feels it like an ache in his gut.

When he touches her again he slides his hand lightly over her stomach, up to her ribs, then pulls back by a fraction of an inch to hover over her breast. “Okay?” he murmurs. She nods and he lets himself touch her, palming her through the thin fabric, rolling his hand over her and squeezing gently. She arches up into his touch, and this time he doesn’t ask for permission—he uses both hands to push the fabric up on her chest, releasing her breasts, and he touches them reverently, making her shiver when he runs his thumbs over her nipples, bringing them to attention and letting out a pleased grunt at the sight.

Every time he thumbs over her, he sees her body react, like a tense shiver she can’t contain. Her eyes flutter closed and she takes a deep, unsteady breath. He runs the pads of his fingers along the soft skin on the underside of her breasts and finally he pinches her nipples, making her cry out.

“Good?” he asks, pleased. She laughs, a little breathlessly, and opens her eyes again. He’s watching her face and she manages to meet his gaze through the dark shield of his helmet. He feels, again, as though she can see right through him. He runs his fingers up over her chest, grazing her collarbone and sliding up her neck until he has them buried again in her hair at the back of her head, cradling her skull in his palm and digging his fingers just slightly in a gentle massage. He bends forward to hover over her and slowly lowers his head to touch his forehead to hers, and they just. Breathe together, for a long moment. It’s as close as he can come to kissing her.

If he tried, he would be able to hear the sounds around them from outside—frogs and insects humming in the reeds, low voices from Omera’s neighbors down the way—but he blocks out everything else and it is almost as though he’s cocooned with her in their own dark, quiet space, the only two people in the universe just for this moment. He can feel her relax under him and he realizes that his own body feels lighter than it has in months. Like she’s dulled the bruised, bone-deep soreness that has built up over time, replacing it with something pleasant and soft.

She reaches to find his free hand, the one not tangled in her hair, and guides it to rest on her hipbone. “Please touch me,” she whispers. He closes his eyes, steeling himself against the heat that courses through him at her words, and he pulls away, nodding.

He guides her hand to tuck her fingers into the waistband of her leggings, giving them a gentle tug. “Take these off,” he tells her. He sits back and focuses for a moment on toeing off his boots and unbuttoning the neck of his shirt so he can pull it off over his helmet. He unbuckles the blaster holstered around his waist, and unstraps the knife attached at his thigh and places them gingerly next to his boots. When he turns back to her, she’s naked and is watching him with a fond smile he’s not sure what he’s done to deserve.

The bed isn’t large, but he doesn’t need it to be. He presses against her side and props himself up on one arm to watch his right hand trail gently over her belly and down between her legs. He feels at the silky skin of her inner thighs, running his knuckles teasingly along the soft flesh there, and he turns his head back to see her face as he finally moves his hand up to reach her core.

It’s gratifying, exactly what he’d wanted, when he touches her. She’s wet for him, giving way for his fingers as he runs them up her slick cunt to land just to the side of her clit. Her face transforms—her head tips back and her mouth falls open, a quiet whimper escaping when he rubs her just right—and she shifts her hips, letting her legs fall open and tilting her pelvis up just a little, like she’s trying to guide his hand where she needs it. He circles his middle finger around her entrance, pausing to hover there.

“Is this what you want?” he murmurs. He taps his finger rhythmically, dipping inside her just far enough to feel the heat waiting there for him.

“ _Yes_ ,” she says, shifting her hips again, and he gives it to her, pumping one finger inside her and then pulling out to include his index finger, relishing the feeling of her stretching around him. The sounds she’s making are entrancing, and he wishes—more than he ever has before with someone, he wishes he could kiss her, absorb those sounds into his body, taste the sweetness of her mouth and the salt on her skin and the slickness on his fingers and—

Before he can think better of it and stop himself, he moves down her body and makes a space for himself between her legs, hooking an arm around her thigh so his left hand rests on her hip. He finally hesitates for a second, stopping to look up at her face, and she’s staring down at him with wide eyes, wondering.

“Close your eyes,” he tells her. She does, immediately, tipping her head back on the bed and shutting them tight. He fumbles to pull his helmet up, just far enough to expose the bottom half of his face. He moves his hand from her hip to the top of his helmet, keeping it balanced in place, and he presses forward to put his mouth on her.

She cries out, a shocked, breathless sound. Her scent is overwhelming; he feels high off of it before he even tastes her. And she _tastes_ … Din has never done this before, never dared to come so close to taking off his helmet. Never cared enough to feel this drawn into another person’s body. So he has nothing to compare this to. But she tastes _good_ , sharp and mild and tangy and sweet. Complex like the expensive bottle of wine he’d bought with a portion of the credits from his first independent bounty hunt to savor alone on his ship, years ago. Like the wine, he thinks, he will never have this again and will always remember it.

He gives her his fingers again, twisting two fingers to pump inside her as he tentatively curls his tongue around her clit, listening for a cue that he’s doing this right. She lets out a quiet gasp and bucks her hips, causing his helmet to bump up awkwardly against his nose. He chuckles, bolstered by her reaction and also, a little bit, thinking of how ridiculous he must look buried between her legs with his helmet balanced precariously on his head, inches away from sacrificing his creed.

He wants to take it off, he _wants_ to take if off—to press his whole face against her soft skin, to feel the warmth of her breast against his cheek, to tease the inside of her thigh with his unkempt beard. To feel her breath on his lips.

And of course he doesn’t take it off. He indulges himself for another minute, flicking his tongue across her clit and riding the rhythm of her movements, feeling how her body opens up to easily accept his thrusting fingers. And he knows it’s not tenable—she will buck too hard and his helmet will topple, or he’ll become too intoxicated by her to bother keeping it on his head—but he just wants to _taste_ her, to memorize her flavor, so he pulls his fingers back out of her and sticks them in his mouth, sucking hard to get every molecule of her on his tongue. And he dips inside her once more and does it again, and again, and finally, aching and resigned, he slips his helmet back over his face and slides his way back up her body.

She turns her face towards him when she feels him move, but her eyes are still closed. She’s panting a little, cheeks flushed with arousal, and she grabs blindly for his hand—the hand he’d just had inside her cunt, inside his _mouth_ —and she presses a kiss to his fingers and draws them softly between her lips and plays her tongue along them the way he wishes he could kiss her. He can’t help the hurt whimper that punches out of his throat, and maybe she hears the modulated effect of the helmet on the sound because she finally opens her eyes and meets his gaze and her actions become more deliberate, sucking his fingers into her mouth and then slowly rolling onto her side and pressing him onto his back till she’s on top of him. She catches both of his hands in hers and tangles her fingers with his and pushes them up above his shoulders on the bed.

“I pinned you,” she says, playfully triumphant, and still a little breathless. Through the dim light he can see that her eyes are sparkling with lust and amusement. “Are you impressed?”

Omera is strong and steadfast and sure with a firearm, all qualities Din admires endlessly in her, but they both know that there is nothing she could do to stop him if he wanted to flip their positions. He tenses his wrists, gripping her hands a little tighter and pulling them higher on the bed, dragging her arms with his.

“I let you,” he points out.

She hums noncommittally, acknowledging the obvious truth but not its importance, and then so quickly he doesn’t see it coming, she ducks her head down and flicks her tongue over his nipple. He gasps, breath catching sharply in his throat, and his hands go slack, falling back against the bed. “Hmm,” she says again, resting her chin on his chest. “What else will you let me do to you?”

He thinks the answer should be obvious, and it overwhelms him a little to think it, so he doesn’t say it— _anything_ —and instead turns the question back on her. “What do you want?”

She’s quiet for a moment, as if she’s giving it some thought, and then she withdraws her hands from his and sits up and backs away till she’s straddling his thighs. She sets down her fingers, playing idly with the fastening on his trousers.

“I want to take these off of you,” she says. She moves her hand and he feels her fingers trailing lightly over the shape of his hardening cock. “And I want to taste you.”

He swallows. The taste of her is still in his mouth. It doesn’t seem possible that she could want him as much as he wants her; he knows with absolute certainty that his body is not as enticing as hers, all jagged scars and hairy legs while she is soft and smooth and rounded at the edges. But she is looking at him expectantly, waiting, so he nods and lifts his hips to let her drag his pants down and lay him bare under her.

She works her hands back up his legs, massaging lightly along his calves and pressing into the muscles of his thighs until she reaches his hips and she spreads her fingers flat against his hipbones and tips her head forward and nuzzles her cheek against his cock. When she lifts her eyes to look up at his face, her expression is so full of affection it makes his breath catch in his throat.

“You are a beautiful man, do you know that?” she asks. Her voice is so soft she could be speaking to herself, if not for the way her eyes are seeking his out through his helmet’s dark visor. Gazing directly up at him.

“You don’t even know what I look like,” he says dumbly. A part of him knows even as he says it that that’s not what she means, but he can’t—he’s struggling to wrap his mind around what she _does_ mean, what she could possibly mean. He doesn’t know it.

“I’m not talking about your face. I mean your—your heart, your soul. The way you care for people.” She tilts her head down again and presses her face to his groin, breathing in his scent. His cheeks burn in a confusing combination of shame and arousal. He knows himself, knows the tally of deaths he has caused, the failures and mistakes he’s made. That he has somehow fooled this sweet woman into believing him _beautiful_ is—another mistake to add to the list, perhaps.

But her voice is so tender, her hands so gentle, her eyes so clear, that he almost believes her.

“I wish you could see yourself the way I see you,” she whispers, and then she takes him into her mouth.

He has to close his eyes as soon as she does it. The sensation of her hot mouth engulfing the head of his cock combined with the vision of her lips wrapping around him is too much to bear and he knows he’ll come too soon if he keeps watching. So he shuts his eyes and clenches his fists in the bedding at his sides and tries to remember to breathe. She hums around him and the vibration sends a jolt right up his spine, making his hips twitch up in spite of himself. She wraps her right hand around his base and sucks harder at the tip of his cock and the moan that rips out of his throat is almost—it’s almost embarrassing, unsettling, how quickly she is making him lose control of himself. He lets her give him her mouth for another minute more, until he can’t take any more, and he pushes her hand away with his own, gripping firmly, pressing his thumb just shy of painfully against the base of his cock.

“O—“ his voice cracks when he tries to call her off. “Omera—“

She slows her movements, dragging her tongue along the underside of his length as she pulls off of him. He opens his eyes again and almost regrets it, groaning immediately at the sight of her swollen lips, her flushed cheeks. Her expectant eyes. His gaze flicks lower. She’s got her left hand buried between her legs. So turned on from tasting him that she’s _touching_ herself. He swears.

“Omera,” he says again, on a whisper. “It’s—too much.” Her brow starts to crease in concern and he corrects himself. “Too good,” he tells her.

“Oh.” She laughs quietly, relieved. “There’s no such thing as too good,” she tells him, but she leaves his cock anyway and kisses her way up his chest. She grazes her teeth along his collarbone and sets them lightly against the tender flesh at the base of his neck, giving him a gentle lovebite.

He thinks of how careful she’d been with his bruises the other day. He thinks of how they all blend together, one overlapping the other in the vulnerable spots where his armor gaps and fists and weapons have a tendency to gravitate. He loses track of the provenance of the marks on his body, often, and it never makes a difference anyway. But he thinks, now, of having an unmistakably mouth-shaped bruise on his neck, from her. And he brings his hand up to the back of her head, gliding his fingers into her silky hair, and presses her face a little harder against his body.

She takes the hint and sets her teeth in deeper, biting down hard enough the air escapes his lungs and his shoulders tense up instinctively. She soothes her tongue over the skin and sucks, making his skin tingle and ache with the pressure. Her body is lined up with his, cunt slicking over his cock, and with his free hand he grabs her hip to hold her in place and rocks his hips up into hers, grinding against her. She moans and finally breaks free of his neck to gasp out, “Gods, I want—I need you inside me.”

He rolls them again so he’s on top of her, fingers interlaced with hers so he’s pinning her down like she’d tried to do with him before. He rocks his hips again, riding his dick over her clit. Getting himself wet with her. “Are you sure?”

There’s a look of desperation on her face. Her fingers grip and release, testing his hold, and she hooks her right leg around his thigh, holding him in place against her. “You don’t—“ she starts, and then lets out a choking laugh, like she’s amused but still dead serious. “You don’t know what it does to a woman, to get her worked up like this and leave her empty. It’s like—an _aching_. I _need_ you.”

The breath rushes out of him, like receiving a kick to the solar plexus. No part of Din’s upbringing has trained him to give in much to self-indulgence. Every moment of this evening has been like a surprise gift, something taken without any expectation of more. He would have stopped at any point if she’d asked, without a trace of resentment or regret. But this? She is asking for more and more and more and he feels almost dizzy from being handed the privilege of giving her what she needs.

He can give her what she needs.

“Alright,” he murmurs. He lets go of her left hand, tracing his fingers soothingly down her side, over the curve of her hip, retreating back to his own body so he can grip himself and guide his dick to her entrance. He watches himself push inside her, enrapt at the vision of his thick cock stretching her open, and then he flicks his eyes up to her face. She looks awestruck, too, pretty eyes staring up at him, a tiny furrow to her brow. He rocks in deeper and her head falls back, exposing her neck. Her mouth falls open in a shocked, helpless moan, and her eyelids flutter closed. He wants—she is so beautiful, but he wants—

“Omera,” he whispers. He lifts his hand up, holds it over the base of her neck for a second before gliding it back to cradle her head, his thumb coming to rest along her jaw. “Look at me.”

Slowly, she opens her eyes. They are hooded, lovedrunk, and she blinks a few times like she’s trying to focus. Then finally they are burning steadily into him. He holds still, waiting for a long moment, until her hips shift under him, pussy clenching tight and fluttering around him like she’s trying to draw him in. “You want more?”

With her free hand she grabs onto his side, digging her fingers in. Pulling him closer. “I want everything you’ll give me,” she tells him.

So he gives her everything, sliding deeper until he is fully seated inside her. She cries out so loudly that he claps his hand over her mouth, shushing her. She goes still and then he feels her tongue on his hand, the scrape of her teeth biting into his palm. Gently, he pulls his hand down again, cupping her jaw.

“I can be quiet,” she says. He shakes his head.

“I don’t want you to be _quiet_ ,” he says, emphasizing it with a shallow thrust that makes her moan. “Just try not to wake the neighbors.”

She laughs, breathlessly, and he starts to move again. She tosses her head to the side, groaning, and pulls his thumb desperately into her mouth, biting down and sucking hard to muffle herself.

She is the tightest, hottest thing he’s ever felt, her cunt gripping so tight around his cock that he feels the slick drag of it every time he pulls out to thrust back in. He feels the heat through his entire body, radiating out from the place where they are connected, feels the pleasure pulsing through his veins, down to his toes and up to his sweat-dampened scalp.

He pulls his thumb from her mouth and drags it wetly down her chest, rolling it over her nipple, catching the edge lightly with his thumbnail.

“Oh,” she says, breathless, voice pitching high, almost a whine. “You’re gonna make me come, you’re—”

She reaches her hand down between them, like she can’t help herself, and he feels her small fingers slip around his cock, feeling where he’s fucking into her. He swears, pushing closer, muscles in his shoulders contracting as he hunches over her.

“Touch yourself,” he rasps. His voice is tight. Every muscle in his body is going tight, fighting to keep control, sensing that inevitable edge approaching. He can’t take his eyes off her face, but he feels every inch of her soft skin where they’re touching. Feels her hand retreat an inch, her knuckles grazing his groin as she follows his command and rubs her fingers over her clit.

“Oh,” she breathes again, and for the first time since they began, she goes silent, just gasping breaths halfway catching in her throat. Her face crumples, devastated with pleasure, and she bites her bottom lip, hard, body bowing and clenching under him, thighs clutching around his hips. Her cunt spasms so tight he doesn’t dare to keep thrusting, just grinds into her, trapping her hand between their bodies as he lowers his head to press his helmet against her forehead again. He wishes he could feel her breath on his face, tries to imagine it as he feels her coming down from her high.

“Good,” he tells her, a little breathless himself, soothing his hand down her side, down to grip her hip as he picks up a rhythm again, making her let out another helpless moan. “Good girl.”

His left hand is still clutched in hers, pressed to the bed above the elbow he’s bracing himself with. She gives it a little tug, gets him to shift his arm closer so she can guide his hand to her hair. He slips his fingers between the strands, feeling it silky on his skin, and then she’s moving a little further, tucking her head down to the base of his neck, mouthing over the spot where she’d bitten him earlier, and she sucks again to deepen the bruise.

He feels himself falling, every contrasting sensation in his body building together—the luxuriant softness of her hair on the pillowcase, the stinging ache of her mouth on his neck, the hot press of her bare skin along his body, and the tight wet heat of her cunt clinging around his cock—creating a pressure down deep in his belly, spurring his hips to thrust faster.

He pulls out—she whimpers, bereft, to be left empty again—pulls back, and hovers over her, pumping his hand over his cock, until he comes in hot spurts onto her stomach with a choked, gasping breath. He squeezes at his dick, drawing it out, pulling the last drops to spill out onto his fingers, and as soon as he lets go she’s reaching for his hand, soft mouth closing greedily around his fingers to suck them clean. He huffs a breath, disbelieving, and then wonders. If she’s trying to memorize his taste like he had with her. And when she’s licked his fingers clean he dips them down to run through the mess on her belly, lets it stick to his fingers and paints it into her mouth again. She sucks his fingers slowly, her eyes heavy and well-satisfied, lingering on his chest and shoulders before coming up to stare up into his visor again.

He collapses onto his side next to her, pulling his hand down to trail over her plush breasts, tracing the curve of her waist, and settling it on her hip. She shifts, tucking her shoulder against his chest, and presses her thighs together experimentally. “I think I’m going to be feeling you for a week,” she tells him.

“Yeah,” he agrees, rubbing a thumb over her hipbone. Wondering already if he can get her to go again before the morning comes. Thinking about having her mouth on him some more. “Yeah,” he sighs. “Me too.”

She smiles up at him, looking pleased at that, and tilts her head to press the softest kiss over his heart.

The morning dawns gray and drizzly. He leaves her bed and when she sees him again, coming out of the barn, he’s in his full armor, every inch of precious skin hidden away again.

She’s familiar with loss, by now, and she doesn’t let herself hope that he’ll come back to her again. She has a piece of him to keep now, in the memory of his body fitting into hers. And she’s given him something, too, tucked into the basket of food she’s prepared for him to take. A moment of romanticism had gotten its grip on her and inspired her to cut a lock of her hair, tied with a slip of ribbon for him to keep. She hopes he’ll appreciate it and not just think her silly. She doesn’t let herself hope that he’ll return but she does hope he’ll run his fingers over the soft strands and remember her. And remember that he knows someone who cares.

The baby is perched on his shoulder, one little hand clutched in the back of the Mandalorian’s cowl to keep him balanced. She rises up on her toes and Mando bends a little at the knees, lowering just enough so she can press a kiss to the baby’s forehead. “Goodbye, love,” she murmurs, and then before he can straighten she turns her head and presses a kiss to his helmet as well.

He stands straight and clears his throat. She wonders if after all this, she’s made him blush.

“Well. Thank you for…” He trails off, like he’s uncertain how to encompass what she’s given him in simple words. “You’ve been very kind to me,” he says finally.

She bites her lip, holding back _stay, stay, stay_ , pushing away _please come back to me_ , and she takes a deep breath so that she can give him a steady smile and tells him instead, “Take care of yourself.”

He nods, raises his hand to her face to brush his thumb over her cheek in a brief, tender gesture, and then he turns to walk away. And she lets him go.

**Author's Note:**

> ETA: chessoup on Tumblr [created a beautiful piece of artwork](https://chessoup.tumblr.com/post/632728214790340608/take-care-inspired-by-alwaysbethewests-tender) inspired by a scene in this fic and I will never, ever be over it <333


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